Gliese 667C – Kelper Mission Discovers Twin Earth!

Billions of potentially habitable alien planets in the Milky Way

(Alien Landscape: Artists impression of sunset scene from the Super Earth orbiting the star Gliese 667C (GJ 667C) which is part of the triple star system. The two more distant stars Gliese 667A and Gliese 667B appear in the sky to the right of the image. Astronomers estimate there of tens of billions of small, rocky habitable worlds, in the Milky Way orbiting faint red dwarf stars within their ‘habitable zones,’ where surface water could support life, and dozens within 30 Light Years of Earth. Image Credit: L.Calgada/ESO)

“This was expected to be a rather unlikely star to host planets. Yet there they are very nearby, metal-poor examples of the most common type of star in our galaxy. The detection of this planet and so nearby, and this soon implies that our galaxy must be teeming with billions of potentially habitable rocky planets.” ~ Steven Vogt

Super-Earth Gliese 667C (GJ 667C)

GJ 667C is an M class red dwarf star in a triple star system. The alien ‘super-Earth’ is situated about 22 Light Years away where it is orbiting it’s red dwarf host star in a period of 28 days, and is about 4.5 times larger than Earth. It is temperate enough to allow liquid water to exist on its surface. It is accompanied by orange K class dwarf stars GJ 667A and B.

GJ 667C receives 90% of light received by Earth, most of which is infra-red, so a higher percentage of incoming energy is absorbed by the planet.

Well worth checking out! Though given the distance it is not likely to be in our lifetime, unless warp speed becomes a reality anytime soon!

“This planet is the best candidate to support liquid water and perhaps life as we know it…”

~ Guillem Anglada-Escude

About 80% of the Milky Way (160 billion) stars are red dwarfs so it is likely that there are around 65 billion stars with habitable Super Earth’s in our galaxy. About 100 lie within 10 parsecs (32.6 Light Years) of Earth.

“Because red dwarfs are so common – there are about 160 million of them in the Milky Way – this leads us to the astonishing result that there are tens of billions of these planets in our galaxy alone.”~ Dr Xavier Bonfils from Grenoble University in France, who led the international team.

THE STUDY – Between February 2008 and April 2009 researchers at the European Southern Observatory, La Sill Observatory in Chile, studied 102 Class M (Red Dwarf) stars situated at a distance of less than 32.6 Light Years away. New planets are discovered by detecting the subtle wobbles that occur when the planets are orbiting their star. 41% of them are orbiting their stars inside the habitable zone, where they could potentially support life.

GJ 667C was discovered by Astronomers from UC Santa Cruz, Steven Vogt and Eugenio Rivera, led by Guillem Anglada-Escude and Paul Butler of Carniegie Institution for Science.

The HARPS high-precision ‘Planet Hunter’ device works with the 3.6m telescope at the Silla Observatory in Chile to bring us these results.

When the information obtained via a telescope was input into the instruments nine super-Earth planets were detected by astronomers. These included Gliese (GJ) 581 and Gliese(GJ) 667C both of which are within the habitable zones of their stars.

However, it should also be remembered that Red dwarf stars are not as super-hot as our star – The Sun. Consequently the super-Earth planets that orbit them must do so at a considerably closer range in order to obtain the necessary heat. With their habitable zones in such close proximity to their stars compared to the distance of Earth to the Sun there is a danger that the potential for life could be inhibited by the dangerous X-ray and ultraviolet flares emitted by their stars, which could successfully frazzle any life!

After re-evaluating information collected back in February, scientists reportedly confirmed on Friday that they had indeed discovered a planet outside of our solar system that is capable of supporting life.

On Friday, the Telegraph published a report confirming the findings.

“Re-analyzing data from the European Southern Observatory, the astronomers found Gliese 667Cc is a solid planet with roughly four and a half times the mass of Earth,” they said, adding that astronomers from the University of Göttingen and the University of California “have calculated the planet receives ten per cent less light from its red dwarf star than the Earth gets from the Sun.”

“It’s the Holy Grail of exo-planet research to find a planet orbiting around a star at the right distance so it’s not too close where it would lose all its water and not too far where it would freeze,” University of California astronomer Steven Vogt said, according to the UK publication. “It’s right there in the habitable zone — there’s no question or discussion about it. It is not on the edge. It is right in there.”

If you and I sneak off now and get a head start on everyone else…lol…we might even make it there in time to celebrate Easter…Year 3012!! What d’ya think? Go for it? lol😉 Bring Chloe along for the ride and we start our own business there breeding “Gliese Ragdolls!!” How’s that for a Cat-tastic business enterprise idea?!🙂

Warp speed and all of our problems are solved…
Oooops, I mean all of our problems are simply replicated on world after world after world…
Sorry, wrong side of bed perhaps. Thanks for your interesting post.
I saw a documentary on satellites recently – amazing the advances they have made. Particularly interesting to me was GRACE, a pair of satellites that map gravitational anomalies; not only long-term ones, but also temporal changes due to things like large floods…

Happy Easter Pat and it’s great to see you🙂 You’re probably right about replicating our problems but you never know…with a bit of luck natural selection will weed out the idiots who create the problems in the first place and we will be left with the ones who have half a brain cell🙂 Oh…ok! I admit it…I was still tucked up under the wolfie duvet in the land of fluffy dreams when those words of wisdom hit me like a lightening bolt😉 Yes…I heard about the GRACE satellites…I can totally understand your interest in them…could be revolutionary!

Exactly! Those were my thoughts too🙂 Hopefully by the time we are in a position to see/know we will have matured past the arrogance and destructiveness that seems inherent within the human race, to become responsible enough to both respect and to benefit from our potential encounters with these newly discovered “super-earths”🙂 And if there are new lifeforms to be found on them … sci-fi meets reality!!🙂

Life on distant planets has to be.. if we think we are but a blue dot of sand amid a sea of sand stars in the Ocean of the Universe we only then begin to see how many planets there are with potential life.. And like you have just stated above here Wolfie Life would probably be very different.. We could be a sea of Conscious gas just floating around in thought.. or that 4 eyed monster with eight legs.. ( ooops no thats the hairy spider I just safely captured and put outside in the garden,)🙂 .. But there are definitely some Green eyed ones lurking somewhere thats to be sure.or a few Grey’s or is that the men in black. haha..
A wonderfully put together Blog my Ice Wolfie friend and loved the picture graphics to accompany it.. Happy Easter my friend and thank you for stopping by today..
~Sue

Hopefully we won’t be in any way related to any other lifeforms they might be residing out there in the galactic cosmos….there are quite enough of us here on Earth without variations on us turning up all over the known universe and worse…beyond it! lol😉 On the other hand it would be awesome to get away from it all and head out to some world slight less heavily populated with humankind!

I wouldn’t mind doing a bit of exploring in outer space
Icywolfy and of course you could bring your duster and
polish along too, well you never know when we might
need to polish the Rocket Ship🙂 Anyway I have really
enjoyed your posting on this excellent theme, I especially
like your choice of graphics that totally enhance your in
depth study on this one, I should read more about this
subject as I used to find it most fascinating🙂 Hey I never
got a reminder update foor this one, but then again I don’t
always get them for everyone else either, just a few here
and there really🙂 I hope that your Easter weekend is still
firing on all cylinders, and that you are tucking into a nice
chocolate egg or three🙂 Mmmmmmmmmm lovely🙂

Bring the Warp Drive with you will you?! Don’t want to be hanging around any one place too long do we? Far too much exploring to do🙂 It is still a fascinating subject…so get reading! A wonderful topic to explore whilst you’re hanging upside down in your batwing’s latest entanglements🙂 I get my updates from my W/P app on my phone now…far more reliable than the other methods which never seem to work properly as you said. RE Easter eggs…they’re all 1/2 price now! I think I may have eaten one or two too many…😉

They have doubled in price around here😦
Ahhhh well at least i can go back to thinking
of not eating all that chocolate, well I coud
do to lose several pounds you know?🙂 lol
I mean it’s hard enough taking off on those
washing lines without any added bulk😦 lol

That’s terrible! DOUBLED in price?!! I guess that’s the Gothic Realm for you…sheer torture!! lol I’m sure you don’t need to lose any extra pounds…being the lean, mean Vampire of the Batwing that you are! lol🙂

Hi there wolfie friend, I hope you have enjoyed the weekend. It is very fascinating to think about all these other places, I enjoyed the very stunning images selected. Now we’re off to another week in this earthly atmosphere(“-“)

Don’t see why not Rumpy🙂 Europa has Icewolves…though granted we have to hunt our own food…but we’re a dab paw when it comes to fishing at the ice holes🙂 Think Alaska Rumpy! You’re a Malamute you should understand perfectly about these arctic type conditions🙂 Now…we just need to find a nice Rumpy-friendly world full of cookies do we not?😉

What a deep post Wolfie, well for me to digest anyhow, but I loved the graphics and the gist of the post, I am very sceptical of other life in the Universe, or if there is it will certainly not be what we’re used to, surely God or whoever was responsible for us, wouldn’t make the same mistake twice, , or would he??😉

Very relieved to see you back Arlene! Where have you been? You haven’t posted anything for weeks and I haven’t seen hide or Wolfie hair of you! I do hope you will be posting something in the next…let me see…30 sec’s sound reasonable to you? lol😉 I bet you were on the F/bk world again weren’t you? Without Wolfie? Terrible…! I would be sceptical of other life in the uni too…it might give us a nasty shock if it proves us NOT to be at the top of the food chain as we tend to assume we are! Still…so long as it’s nothing like us we should be ok…ish!! Now…there are lots of nice choccie eggs and a few meaty flavoured ones for Tango and Ruby scattered around my blog🙂 But if you want them you’ll have to go hunting!! Careful not to slip on the icy patches…and don’t go eating Tango’s eggs…you might not like them!😉

Life elsewhere is indeed a potential that humankind has mused over since early times. Seeing more recent discoveries such as the ones you presented Wolfie ferms up the matter. This is a very complete and convincing post. Don’t you have friends up there Wolfie? love always, Eddie

We don’t seem to be finding much “life as we know it” out there but we’re racking up a fine collection of newly discovered worlds to “keep under our belts!” I have many friends up there Eddie…but best we don’t tell anybody where they are? You know what humans are like for spoiling it all!😉 x

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Ice wolves of Europa. Intergalactic star wolves running with the moon and the stars in the light of another world. Callers of the moon wolves-song and interstellar hunters across the icy surface of the Europan seas. Echoing the call of an alien world and the whispering of the moonshadows, the call of the star songs, and the dream of worlds beyond the stars and cities in the sky.